Are Apple going to be the next Smart Parts.

[Tom Allen]

No, they're not bringing out a paintball marker before you get all exited, What i'm referring to is the way Apple are trying to corner the mobile phone market with seemingly innocuous patents that are designed to harness the control functions of mobiles.

I'm no socialist, far from it, but it sticks in my throat when one company manipulates a marketplace to an extent that it strangles new design ideas. SP went down this road and would have succeeded if it wasn't for the likes of WDP and Dye, but unfortunately this only brought upon us a wider based control of the same basic control patents.

Is this the future of all products in this age,?

I've never been a "sheep" (strange coming from wales you say), i've always looked at something and tried to see the pros and cons of design and function, but is this basic right going to be removed by corporate greed and patent control.

 

[The Zambezi Kid]

Sadly, that is the downside of Capitalism. Many a big firm's only motivation is the continued generation of ever larger profit, and they will not hesitiate to use any method at their disposal to do so, be they fair or foul.

Take a look at HSBC Bank for example. It was on the news a couple of months ago that they "only" made about 23 Billion pound profit (I think, can't remember the exact figure), so they decided to lay off 20000 workers to save money. As long as you have maximum profit generation as the main motivation, these things will happen.

 

[stongle]

Sadly, that is the downside of Capitalism. Many a big firm's only motivation is the continued generation of ever larger profit, and they will not hesitiate to use any method at their disposal to do so, be they fair or foul.

Take a look at HSBC Bank for example. It was on the news a couple of months ago that they "only" made

about 23 Billion pound profit (I think, can't remember the exact figure), so they decided to lay off 20000 workers to save money. As long as you have maximum profit generation as the main motivation, these things will happen.

Its a lot more complex than that. It sucks to be on the end of a cost cutting / downsizing exercise, however the drivers are not "outright profiteering".... The G20, EU, UK Govt, you (or rather anyone with a pension invested in UK equity) and anyone whom thinks bank accounts should be free; are all in part responsible for mass redundancies.

HSBC 2011 profit was quoted in USD so actually £14.7bn (pre-tax) earnings. However, with an increasing cost base (up 10%), requirements to retain more profits as a capital buffer / loan loss provision & deal with increased regulatory requirements (pace of Regulatory change is almost exponentially increasing); and not too mention meet shareholder expectation / Return on Equity (against a background of shrinking revenues), but what you don't see is Banks cornering the IP.

Monopoly markets or oligopolies are bad things for banks as they benefit from dispersion (diversification) of products and services and elimination of idiosyncratic risk (a kind of concentration risk).. Elimination of Idiosyncratic Risk is a key target for banks as their holdings are so large (given the amount of leverage in the system). Being over proprietary with information or being opaque makes it difficult to de-risk but you also prone to additional regulatory scrutiny, and there is a whole range of tools (taxes) the regulators (and by extension Govts) have to make banking super expensive (and guess whom pays for that - the consumer or the worker).

So there you have it, Banks are more ethically friendly than Apple. You heard it hear first.

 

[no-infernomark]

Apple, in my opinion. will not be like SP however Microsoft will be i think. with the increasing amount of consumer interaction apple has the market standard (Microsoft) will slowly filter out to be replaced by Apple. not just in mobile phones but desktops, company software and the likes. From a reliable source, Apple are about ten years advanced from what they are releasing today (fold-able screens etc) yet if they brought it out now, so much bad stuff would happen to the economy and people. IBM used to be the industry standard and look what happened there. as markets evolve and the products in them new companies will always grow and become more dominant however there are things in place to prevent market dominance and try make things fair.

 

[Tom Allen]

not on the same page as you there mate.

While there will always be a place for niche companies like apple, who let it be said have their fair share of the market, there is no way on earth they will remove Microsoft.

Mark, apple get there mobile screens from Sony, they have survived by innovating and creating vogue items such as the Icrap.

Every company at the cutting edge is many years ahead as far as design is concerned, but to say ten years is a bit silly.

Unless they're aliens

 

[Bon]

To be honest id be more concerned about 1st world government funded malware and viruses. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-18238326